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Yugoro’s blade was a normal katana in appearance, and any attempts to detect magic on the sword gained nothing more than the minor sensation that some spirit inhabited it. The shozai-gaki within the blade would attempt to take control of any who wielded the katana. The bearer would be immune to all forms of magical compulsion, charm effects, and fear while he carried the sword. In addition, the bearer dealed more damage and detect falsehoods with ease. [1]

The blade was awakened after the death of the sadistic ronin at the hands of the magistrateIde Ashijun. A powerful gaki that had been observing the greedy ronin for years took advantage of that moment and opened a passage into Ningen-do from Gaki-do, the Realm of Hungry Dead. It lifted up Yugoro's body and feasted upon all but one of the remaining magistrates, including Ashijun himself. The powerful spirit had merged with Yugoro to become a shozai-gaki. [2] The gaki bound himself to one of the many swords that laid about in the Yugoro's Lair, and convinced the lone survivor, a yoriki of Ashijun, to carry him from the area. The spirit would attempt to find a soul weak enough to take over so that Yugoro's spirit might once more return to Ningen-do and terrorize the merchants of Rokugan. [1]

Ide Nominari, Ashijun's granddaughter, got the katana in her gempukku. The spirit within the blade claimed to be Ashijun's restless spirit, and guided the samurai-ko since to find the remnants of the former bandit-lord. Nominari began to suffer occasional headaches, and she had been blacked out for days or weeks if she did not find tracks of Yugoro. The blade's soul swore she would rest after Yugoro's Lair was found. [2]

In winter of 1162 Nominari found the lair, she was trapped there due to winter storms, and the shozai-gaki took control of her mind near permanently and forced her to feed from the flesh of her peasant servants. [3] In 1165 Nominari had rebuilt Yugoro's Hordes, and she had taken the name Yugoro and passed herself off as a man as often as not. [4] In 1167 Nominari's bandit gang theft the cargo of a kobune in the River of Gold. His captain Yoritomo Bunmei and Akasha hunted them down in the Shinomen Mori, killing her and several of her fellows. [5]